On Saturday night at the DC Armory Hopkins, the IBF light heavyweight champion, will attempt to become the oldest fighter to unify major titles, when he meets Beibut Shumenov, the WBA beltholder from Kazakhstan. Both fighters made the 175lb limit at Friday’s weigh-in.

“This is a defense of my legacy,” said Hopkins at Thursday’s final press conference. “I know he’s coming to fight. The best of him will bring out the very best in me. I want him to come and try to win every round.”

The consensus thinking is that Shumenov (14-1, 9 KOs), a 2/1 underdog with a limited resumé, will join the ever-growing list of younger titleholders to prove no match for Hopkins’ skill, experience and ring intelligence. The 30-year-old Kazakh has quietly held the WBA strap since 2011, when he won a split decision over Gabriel Campillo in his 10th professional fight.

Hopkins (54-6-2, 32 KOs), is at an age – eight months from his 50th birthday – at which complacency or nature could drive the whole enterprise south very rapidly. Yet the surefire Hall of Famer insists he is as frosty as ever.

“I’m not getting rocked to sleep by this guy,” Hopkins said. “This is not a hobby. This is bloodsport.”

Hopkins’ famed psychological tactics took center stage at Thursday’s press conference – as he opened his remarks, he grabbed the two belts sitting in front of Shumenov and moved them to his side of the podium. Only when he concluded with a slight at the well-to-do upbringing of Shumenov, a lawyer and businessman who speaks five languages, did the Kazakh appear to react.

“He wants to go home!” Hopkins said. “He’s rich! What does he want to die for? I come out of the hood. I come out of the ghetto. We had to fight. So a man talks that nonsense to hype himself up … You’re rich. You’re fighting for a hobby. We had to fight to keep our hat on in North Philly.”

That prompted to Shumenov to his feet for a brief retort, as he crossed the dais to retrieve his property. But his hesitation, to Hopkins, spoke volumes.

“The idea is when I took the belts, you should have got up and took them back," he explained afterwards to a scrum of reporters. "The damage has been done."

Hopkins has defied expectations and cheated time so consistently it is difficult to keep his accomplishments in scope. He defended the middleweight crown a division-record 20 times between 1995 and 2005 – more than Marvin Hagler, Carlos Monzon or Sugar Ray Robinson – then moved up two weight divisions and twice won light heavyweight titles after his 40th birthday. He is now in a third stint as a 175lb champion.

Hopkins' extraordinary backstory has been exhaustively documented – but it bears repeating. He was arrested more than 30 times before he turned 17, when he was finally sent to Graterford State Prison on an 18-year sentence for armed robbery. As Prisoner No Y4146, he became a jailhouse boxing champion.

"See you when you come back," was the last thing Hopkins heard as the bars clanked shut behind him 56 months later –the first of countless naysayers whose doubt he has repurposed for motivation.

And now here Hopkins is, more than a quarter-century on, the favorite against yet another opponent young enough to be his son.

“Thirty is old in boxing,” said Naazim Richardson, Hopkins’ longtime trainer. “Guys still perform at that age, but 30 is old in boxing. So what he’s doing is ridiculous.”

Richardson said the public is shortchanging his fighter by calling him the oldest boxer to win a title: he believes Hopkins is the oldest athlete to win a major championship in any sport.

“Every water bottle, every hand wrap he takes off his hand, every speed bag he hits now is a part of a history, because what he’s doing now has never been done,” Richardson said. “He is a special athlete.”

Hopkins was presented with a portrait of himself on Thursday – it will hang in the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery, an honor reserved for Americans who have influenced the country's history and culture.

Yet for the ageless Hopkins, the honor is premature. History is very much a work in progress.